


The Obligatory Adventure

by Serriya (Keolah)



Series: Fox Paws [4]
Category: Dungeons & Dragons - Fandom, Werewolf: The Apocalypse
Genre: Crossover, Gen, Kitsune, Parody, Quests, Shapeshifting, Too Many Pop Culture References
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-05-12
Updated: 2006-07-12
Packaged: 2017-12-09 06:18:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/770970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keolah/pseuds/Serriya
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A kitsune and her friends go on a gratuitous quest for a macguffin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Generic Tavern

The three-tailed yellow kitsune Goldentail bounded out into the streets of Torn Elkandu, bouncing along and weaving through the crowds agilely, heading toward the west of town, toward the gardens. Out past the trees, over the flowers and around the bushes, she darted out unerringly to a fountain she had mentioned earlier to her friends.

"Here, over here!" she called.

The half-elf, Morin, panted as he caught up to them.

The other kitsune, Fantasia, a white-furred one with many tails, followed in equally nimble fashion, grinning brightly and having a grand time in the headlong chase. She felt a moment of pity for Morin as they reached their destination, but laughter quickly emerged as she darted to the fountain and did her best to throw water in his direction. "That'll help ya cool down!"

"Ack, thppt!" Morin said, futilely warding off the wet attack.

Goldentail giggled. "Here, here," she said, heading over to a stone archway that at first appeared to be glowing, but it turned out to be only sunlight shining through into the dimmer landscape of Torn Elkandu.

Fantasia grinned, relenting in the attack and hopping up on the edge of the fountain to balance precariously and walk in the direction Goldentail was so eager to show off. Her tails swayed to balance her as she minced long the carved rim and then bounced down to the ground to go take a look at the arch.

"Here here? Or somewhere near here here?" Fantasia grinned.

"Over here, lookie, there's the portal!" Goldentail said, pointing to the archway.

Morin looked and said, "Oooh, sunlight."

"Real, honest sunlight," Fantasia agreed happily, leaning to rest her hands against the arch and peering through it from one side and then the other. She grinned, looking at her companions. "Let's go!" She moved without further thought or worry to take advantage of the thing.

The others followed through behind her, the werewolf Shenzel and the were-panther Thorn taking up the rear. They emerged into a sparse evergreen forest in the highlands of northern Serriya. The sun was shining brightly and the sky was a very normal, reassuring azure dotted by puffy white clouds. Off in the distance down in the valley, lines of smoke gave sign of civilization.

Fantasia closed her eyes, smiling in delight as she turned her muzzle up toward the sun and its warmth. She had realized how she'd missed the sun and moon, after a fashion, but being faced with both again was a bliss beyond description... it was how things were _supposed_ to be! She drew a deep breath, smelling the forest and everything else, then opened her eyes to look into the distance.

"Hmm, a village?" she asked.

"Uh-huh," Goldentail said, bouncing around and hopping down a path leading in that general direction. It didn't appear that people traveled to and from Torn Elkandu much around here.

Morin commented, "I do hope they have indoor plumbing."

Fantasia grinned at Goldentail, the expression turning more sly at Morin's remark. "Mm, yeah," she agreed. "There's something to be said about nice long, hot showers." A flirt of bushy tail and a deepening grin accompany it, then she turns to lightly follow after the other kitsune. She should probably try out her new ability, she muses, but that could wait for a little while yet.

The village wasn't too far away, although Morin was already grumbling about all the hiking through the wilderness he'd been doing lately, and it wasn't nearly as primitive as one might have feared. It was an old human village, made up of solid stone buildings, that had probably been here since the creation of Serriya.

"Oh come on," Fantasia poked playfully at Morin. "If a city fox like myself can live with it, so can you. Let's take a look around and see what we can find! No telling what secrets and treasures and dragons and quests and... Ooh!" She grinned and bounced a bit, then darted to start taking that look around she'd mentioned.

The town was inhabited primarily by humans, although there are a handful of beings of other species passing through. They looked over a bit oddly at the newcomers, but relaxed a bit when they noticed they weren't wild animals.

"Psst, hey Goldentail!" Fantasia prodded for the other kitsune's attention. "Silly question, one I can probably answer without a doubt and know I'll regret it, but what do they use for money around here?"

They'd have to be inventive, depending on the answer to that one and the opportunities available to snatch a substantial and suitable amount of the stuff.

"Gold, silver, copper, the usual sort of stuff," Goldentail replied. "Not that silly paper that some planets use."

"Shoulda known," Fantasia smirked. "What would a Dungeons and Dragons world be without the standard gp and down? Okay, oh brilliant and clever native guide..." She grinned. "At least I can be pretty sure you're brighter than the _last_ one! Anyway, what kind of options are there for getting set up here? I don't have Fort Knox in my backpack or anything. Well, maybe, but if it's there it's _not my fault_!"

"Hmm, well, maybe somebody in the tavern will have something that needs to be done..." Goldentail said pensively. "Or something."

Fantasia giggled, but didn't share the source of her amusement immediately since the memories of long nights spent among flaky Glass Walkers and their gaming obsession would probably only draw weird looks.

"To the tavern then!" she said instead, unable to refrain from adding, matter-of-factly, "That's where all adventuring parties gather and set out on their quests, after all. Hehe."

Morin said, "I'm afraid I don't have a beard or sufficient gray hair to be the wizened mage."

Thorn looked at him oddly.

The tavern was a large stone building with a sign hanging over it depicting a sword and a feather. It is presently inhabited by several humans, a couple dwarves, a beastman, a few elves, a winged guy, and an obligatory shadowy hooded figure in the corner.

Elves... they were just so... pretty! Probably a point of interest, Fantasia grinned to herself with a sideward glance. "Gandelf you're not," she replied lightly, eyes adjusting quickly to the dimmed light. "But ya work with what you have. Now..."

She hmmed and looked around speculatively, then headed for the bar. Bartenders _always_ knew more than anyone else, even usually back home. There's a middle-aged fellow with a short beard futilely wiping something that stubbornly decided to remain perpetually dirty.

"Can I get you something?" he said as they approached.

Fantasia grinned broadly at the fellow. "Actually, we're new in town and were just kinda wondering if there was anything interesting going on that you've heard of. Care to spin a tale, friend? I'm willing to exchange some entertainment to brighten the place up a bit for it."

He continues to wipe the thing persistently, with little to no effect. "Oh, I hear of some issues up in the mountains, up near the Shrine of Garan Kal and all... they say weird stuff is happening up there, with ghosts and werewolves or monsters or something..."

"Oh?" Fantasia's ears perked at that, and she almost giggled as she recognized a certain growth of the adventurous spark within. It'd always been there, of course, what Ragabash _didn't_ have it? But how many opportunities had been given to really let it out and do whatever came of it? Oh, glorious fun indeed! "So how would I go about finding this shrine?"

"Well, you head north from here and follow the river up to the waterfall, then you turn east and head along the cliff toward the three peaks you'll see close to one another head, and when you reach the boulder that's shaped like an egg, turn left and head straight up the mountain, you can't miss it."

Gone were the days of nice, sensible city maps, but Fantasia could live with that. She made note of the directions and glanced aside to her companions with a grin. "Any objections to a nice little stroll? Plenty of rest the last week or so, about time to work out the kinks!"

Morin sighed in resignation. "Oh fine... I suppose it can't be that bad... all that uphill walking..."

Goldentail giggled and said, "It's not that far from here. Come on!"

"Oh don't be so gloomy," Fantasia admonished lightly.

She turned to follow after Goldentail but paused to lick Morin lightly on the cheek before continuing on. He was cute, morose and easily resigned, but still cute. She whistled a bright and airy tune as she headed back out into the sunshine, one that anyone who'd seen would recognize instantly from the merry dwarven miners headed off to their work.

And so, they came out and located without much difficulty the river running beside the town and winding up the valley higher into the mountains.

Fantasia turned to follow the river in search of the first landmark the barkeep had mentioned. Her spirits were high, and she knew why, but she didn't bother thinking about it much and just enjoyed the feel of the sun and the wind, listening to the sounds around her and occasionally giggling at one thought or another.

Morin muttered, "You know, we could have stopped for a bite to eat while we were in town..."

Thorn replied, "You were expecting a free lunch?"

Morin snorted softly and sighed.

Fantasia laughed. "Oh cheer _up_! It'll do all of us good to get the exercise and work off the flab gained through a week of lounging about and scarfing all the junk food available."

Not that she had to worry, any shapeshifter's metabolism from back home was just nuts. Never had seen a single one that had gone even _slightly_ toward fat. Her ears perked and swivelled, listening to the song of birds nearby.

Morin said, "If you say so."

Goldentail giggled and pranced alongside the river lightly. Up ahead somewhere, the sound of rushing water can be heard in the distance.

"Of course," Fantasia replied with a ready grin. "A fox nose always knows, and there's no two nos about it!"

The waterfall was near, at least, and they could take a little breather from the walk, that should cheer him up a _little_ at least. She chuckled softly and continues in that direction, thoughts turning to another matter entirely after the mention of werewolves earlier.

Soon enough, they came upon the waterfall. It was hardly the most magnificent or spectacular specimen of its type, but nonetheless it was rather pretty, and pretty wet.

"Neat," Fantasia remarked, just looking at it for a minute. Okay, so she was a city fox, a Glass Walker at heart, but that didn't mean she couldn't appreciate the view. "Take a load off, troops," she said after, gesturing to rocks and whatever else nearby, moving to avail herself of one as well to unshoulder her backpack. "May as well rest a little bit here, catch our breath, all that jazz. Hey, Shenzel? C'mere."

Morin took a seat on a rock and apparently sat on a slug judging by his exclamation that followed. Shenzel sniggered softly at him and went over to Fantasia. Thorn rolled her eyes and plopped down to rest.

Fantasia looked sharply over at the exclamation, then snickered to herself as she looks back and dug through her pack. "Now where was that?" she muttered, then 'ah-hahs!' and drew out the length of the sheathed sword she'd been carrying originally from inside. "I'm sure the spirits are already cranky about the treatment!"

Morin proceeded to hop around cursing slugs, snails, insects, spiders, and snakes. Shenzel quirked an eyebrow rather expressively.

Fantasia bit her lip to restrain the impulse to laugh, eyes alight with humor as they stole a sideward glance. Oh, poor Morin... she sighed instead and turned her attention back to what she'd been thinking of before. She held the sheathed weapon out at arm's length in Shenzel's direction, the thing was as big as she was, and unlike any other klaive ever made the sheathe and hilt were plain and unadorned.

"Here," she said. "There's a story that goes with it, and I'll tell you sometime if you're interested, but I really think that ol' Moonshadow here will be happier with a Garou than some crazy fox who's already done what she set out to."

Shenzel was still a bit puzzled but she said, "Very well then, as you wish," and went to take it.

Morin hopped around some more by the water and said, "Damnit, I swear when I get home I'm going to learn a bug-repellant spell."

Fantasia smiled a bit wistfully, looking at the weapon, one of the few things which still tied her to the past, but shook it off readily enough. "Great klaive, an old one," she said, "and made of moonsilver. Thought of it on the way here after hearing about the werewolves earlier. One of the war spirits bound inside will make that thing deadly to anyone, but moonsilver is _double_ lethal against shapeshifters." She shrugged lightly and looked away. "Not much good to me, it's about as big as I am even in crinos form. Shouldn't prove any problem for you, though."

"Perhaps so," Shenzel said, looking it over thoughtfully.

Goldentail said, "Yeah... Garan Kal is the Wolf God, I wonder what might be going on up there?"

"No way but to find out," Fantasia replied, the momentary shadow blowing away like clouds before the sunlight of good cheer, and she giggled. "Well, as soon as Morin's done cursing ever creepy crawly known to man and otherwise, and is ready to move on."

"Alright, alright, let's go," Morin said, brushing a particularly large and interesting specimen off his shoulder.

Thorn sniggered at him softly some more.

Re-shouldering her pack and standing, Fantasia grinned at him. "Careful hero, there's two of us running around now, you don't want to tempt one or the other into a string of pranks by showing such an obvious weakness. We're only foxes, after all, without the superhuman control it'd take to resist such a fine and delightful pastime!"

Morin said fondly, "You are incorrigible."

Goldentail giggled and trotted along up the mountain trail.

"Naturally, I'm a fox!" Fantasia replied with a wink.

She hurried to catch up on the trail of the other kitsune. Beautiful day, good company, adventure in the air... what more could a fox possibly wish for? Well, a few possibilities swim wickedly to mind, but she shushed them aside for now.

Morin was quickly set to panting at the steep mountain trail, but the terrain was at least not overly rugged or hard to follow the trail, either. The path clearly has been used at some point or another by people, no doubt the inhabitants of the nearby village.

Fantasia looked at Morin now and again, thinking, then grins as she dropped back in the procession a bit and out of his direct line of sight. Might as well give the poor guy a break, and it wasn't like she wasn't familiar with four paws... She halted for a minute, thinking and poking at the new ability that Shazmar had given her for her wish, then slowly transformed to a creature bearing a strong resemblance to a Garou in Hispo... or a dire wolf.

Shaking her shaggy head energetically, she loped easily to catch up again, angling in to one side of Morin to nudge the small of his back with her now much larger muzzle. "Wurf!" she said playfully.

"Eeeop!" Morin said, jumping a good five feet into the air in surprise.

The coloration was pretty much a dead giveaway, being as snow-white as Fantasia has always been. Beyond that, the twinkle of laughter in her eyes at his reaction should prove evidence enough. She dropped to her belly nearby, turning to look at Shenzel with a wolfish grin as she spoke the only way the form could, in the natural tongue of the Garou, "Tell him to hop on, wouldja? Save some time _and_ energy."

Shenzel glanced curiously to Fantasia and chuckled in amusement at Morin's panicking. "Do relax, you silly goof."

Morin went, "I-It's a ghost wolf! Eeek!" He ran around.

Fantasia snorted bemusedly and rose, then stalked over and took advantage of the _much_ larger form to lick Morin in the face. Probably not all that reassuring coming from a wolf standing taller at the shoulders than Morin himself, nor with the brush of inches-long fangs lining the muzzle, but the sharp snort denoted exasperation and amusement rather than anything else as she dropped to her belly again, tail wagging.

Under Shenzel's gentle urging, Morin finally calmed down and went, "Er, oh, right. Wow, I didn't know you could do _that_..."

She was going to have to find a better way to communicate, Fantasia decided. All fine and good to speak Garou when that was all you were running around with, or with those who understood it, but what good was it doing now? She snorted, eyes still glittering with amusement as she looked at him and left Shenzel the translating for now, "I couldn't, not until my wish anyway, only a fox before."

Morin blinked for a moment then observed, "And you can't turn into something that can speak normally? Thorn and Shenzel don't seem to have any trouble with it..."

Fantasia blinked at that, ears flicking in startlement at the idea, then really _thought_ about it for a second. She'd seen some Garou who had such control of their shifting that _they_ could, so... why not? She tilted her head, poking thoughtfully again and making a deep sound in the bellows-path of her throat, then tentatively managed, "See Spot run..." Rough, but definitely understandable. She offered that wolfish grin once more. "Always knew you were a smart one, Hero. Climb on, and let's go."

Morin chuckled and went to climb onto her back, and said, "You know, there are so many comments I could make about this, but I believe I shall restrain myself from any bad puns."

Fantasia rose gently, careful of the slight weight at her back and prepared to move at any sign of instability. "Don't think I didn't think of or consider using one," she replied teasingly, then ambled forward at a slow trot at first to let him get comfortable with the idea.

Geez, it was no wonder the Garou were fond of this form... the sheer _strength_ and vitality of it was a rush! They continued along the mountain trail, the sounds of birds chirping decorating the noonday wind. The trail wound along and a cool mountain breeze brushed against them lightly.

Thorn said, "So is that what you wished for then?"

Fantasia drank in the slightly shifted perceptions of the form avidly, never having guessed that even her own sharp ones were incredibly _dull_ in some ways compared to the Garou. It was... just wow. She settled into an easy lope as they traveled, nowhere near the speed that the form was capable of sustaining for long periods but readily suited for traveling together and just enjoying the day.

"Yup!" she answered Thorn's question brightly. "I remembered you telling me about someone you'd heard of that could change into anything and thought, 'Well hey, I'm a shapeshifter already, how difficult would _that_ be for Shazmar to do?' And he did. Besides, there's lots of fun that can be had with it." The chuckle that emerged was necessarily much deeper and less cheerful-sounding than her normal, but clearly amusement.

"Not difficult at all, really," Thorn said. "He's God, after all."

"Yeah well," Fantasia replied. "Not all gods are equal when it comes to having a sense of humor and seeing the potential for a bit of fun, either. I can tell ya right now that the Glass Walkers back home would be terrified if they knew what had happened." She grinned at the thought, imagining the stuffy old Don she'd left behind scrambling into the safety of the nearest tree at the very idea.

"So," Morin said. "When are we going to visit _your_ home?"

The trail broadened out, and ahead the mountains that the barkeep described could be clearly seen in the distance.

Fantasia swivelled toward him, signalling her attentiveness even before she spoke. "Well, now that my own little bit of work is done," she replied thoughtfully, "I don't see any reason not to do it whenever someone's inclined to. I just hadn't really thought about it."

"And there's no wereskunks there, right?" Morin asks trepidatiously. Thorn sniggered softly.

Fantasia's sides rumbled with amusement at that. "No, no wereskunks. Lions and tigers and bears, oh my! And lots of other things, but Gaia wasn't crazy enough to come up with the idea of making those critters shapeshifters. Oh the _stink_ the others would have raised if she had..." She rolled her eyes, grinning at the bad pun.

"Perhaps we should head there next, then," Thorn said, snickering some more. "I certainly have nothing better to do..."

Shenzel refrained from comment, staring off at the horizon thoughtfully.

"It's changed a lot in the last decades," Fantasia replied. "That story I told at the competition had something to do with it, but there's a lot more that went on behind the scenes which would have been just too much to fit in. Magic's a lot more prevalent there now, after the Awakening, along with the cybernetic stuff the Glass Walkers could let loose openly after the Veil got shattered."

"I'll presume you don't mean like the Planar Wars..." Morin said. "Aside from that, I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Umm..." Fantasia replied, thinking about it and ordering events in her mind for a moment. "Well, as Shenzel would know, all the shapeshifters and other supernatural creatures of the world had hidden out of the sight of mankind as much as they could for a _very_ long time, each for reasons of their own. The Garou, waaaay back, actually watched over mankind and..." here, her muzzle wrinkled in distaste.

"They culled the humans, like herds," she continued. "It was called the Impergium, and the Garou were really, really serious about their duties. That got brought to an end eventually through the workings of a couple tribes..." She glanced over at Shenzel and grinned. "Children of Gaia and the Warders of Man slash the Glass Walkers, to be precise.

"It definitely had a lasting effect, though. Some kind of reaction in the human mind, even thousands upon thousands of years later, remembered the Garou and caused the Delirium. That had a different effect on different people, but usually it caused the brain to short circuit when they saw a Garou in Crinos, the war form, maybe just forgetting it or rationalizing it as something else entirely. The Veil had something to do with that, a really _strict_ rule.

"The Garou decided they'd hide away from the growing masses of mankind, continuing to fight their own battles here and there as they were needed and using the Delirium to cover up when they had to cross humanity's path. 'The Veil Shall Not Be Lifted' was the stricture, one of the toughest and hardest-enforced rules of the Litany. It was for their own protection."

"That sounds really weird," Morin said. "I can't understand how if somebody saw a werewolf, they didn't just realize that's a werewolf. I mean, it should be pretty obvious by that point, shouldn't it?"

"You'd think so, wouldn't you?" Fantasia replied. "But you have to remember that the shapeshifters there are tied really closely to the spirit world, some theorizing that they're at least half spirit and half flesh... and considering the real possibility of encountering an ancestor spirit in the Umbra or finding one returning as a Garou, I can't say with certainty that it's not true.

"However weird it might be," she continued, "It all got blown the hell away when the Glass Walkers did something that was a bit risky... we got one of our own in the White House." She snorted. "Hell, after the idiot who'd been there the years before, the people probably would've accepted a green glowing demon rather than another Republican as president! Anyway..." She paused, regathering the thread of her thoughts.

"Yeah," she went on firmly, "So there's the big bad wolf in the White House and nobody the wiser, or so we thought. Unfortunately, one of the groups that were enemies _did_ know about it and chose a rather nasty time to do something about it... the inaugural parade. Imagine our surprise, and the surprise of the world as a whole as the president and his nearest guards went all tall, dark, and raging fuzzy!"

"Well, I imagine that could put a slight kink in the celebrations," Morin said.

Thorn said, "I'll presume a 'Republican' is something bad, right?"

Fantasia smirked. "Don't ask me about politics, always hated the stuff, but yeah... Republicans tend to rate lower than lawyers on the evolutionary chain, and that's saying a lot coming from _me_!" Considering Jez'kai had been a lawyer as his profession, oh yeah. "But anyway, funny thing about it was that this being broadcast over the air didn't incite the Delirium like usual.

"So now the world knew for a fact that werewolves existed... what _else_ might be out there? I've heard some rumors and theories about what happened afterwards, but essentially it boiled down to the Fae folk suddenly being thrust from their own hiding as well overnight, literally waking to find that their veils of illusion just weren't as impervious when people were in a wondering state of mind.

"Oh man," she snickered. "Talk about some fun times around _then_! All the shapeshifters got tossed out there, the various kinds of Fae, the leeches, even mages and ghosts... Heh, and that was, ohhhh, sixty or more years ago? Lots of changes since then, I doubt people'd blink an eye at any of you by now, other than the girls drooling after those cute pointy ears of Morin's."

"Sounds like fun," Morin said. "Er, the uh, other part... not the... I mean..."

Thorn sniggers at him some more.

"Sounds kind of like Devenia," Thorn commented.

Fantasia grinned and turned her head back to nip near his toes, then returned her attention to the path ahead with a deep chuckle. "Not really, Thorn," she replied. "There's a lot more to it, and most of the world is industrialized by now with huge cities that sprawl for miles and miles. The technology's tending more toward some of the stuff I've seen since coming here... Like my own implants," she added. "Though they're not without dangers of their own just like magic."

Morin said, "Devenia's been stuck in something of an echo of twentieth century Terra... for quite some while now, so I hear. There was this creepy old guy from there who had a huge mansion with zombie servants... including a butler named Igor..."

Fantasia laughed. "No, don't think you have to worry about anything like that, other than maybe some of the things that leeches can do there. Overall it's calmed down a lot, jumping right from good ol' twentieth century to some bizarre cross of sci-fi and fantasy in a really short time." She snorted. "Of course, Grant probably had a hell of a lot to do with that, just like so much else."


	2. The Quest for the MacGuffin

Around another bend on the trail, they came upon a large boulder shaped very much like an enormous chicken egg. Morin said, "Oh, look, this must be the landmark..."

"Hummm," Fantasia mused, looking around. "He said turn left and go up the mountain, that shouldn't be too tough to figure out."

Not far along the trail up the steep slope to the left of the boulder, they saw a building perched high upon a cliff overlooking the valleys below. It was made of solid stone and has a vaguely shrine-like appearance.

Fantasia could think of a thousand and two irreverent quips she could make on the setting, but refrained and simply headed in that direction to take a look. Wolves and wolfish supernatural entities were not renowned for their senses of humor.

As they came close to the shrine, they saw that it was adorned only with a single symbol: a wolf paw carved into the stone above the entrance. No ghosts or werewolves or monsters had manifested to eat them.

That was a plus at least, and Fantasia sank to the ground to let Morin off, barely refraining from a remark from the grin that appeared on the broad muzzle.

Morin climbed off and looked ahead at the stone shrine, plants clinging to the ground and vines creeping up the walls of it. "Well... I guess this is it. I haven't seen too awful many other wolf shrines up here I suppose."

Fantasia shifted back to her normal foxish form and stretches languidly. "Mm yep, probably, can't imagine someone setting up a fake one just for lil ol' us." She chuckled and walked toward it, looking around. "No sign of the ghosties and goblins the bartender mentioned, though, or of His Fuzziness himself."

The doors were wide open and the interior looked very austere and pristine, as if untouched by the passing of ages, or at least possessing a self-sweeping-floor spell.

Fantasia looked at the rest of them, then shrugged lightly and walked tentatively inside. "Hellooooo..." she called out, looking around and advancing cautiously. Remembering the totem spirit Wolf back home, she really hoped that the resident god had a bit more of a sense of humor after the 'His Fuzziness' thing.

There came a deep rumbling sound from deeper within the temple, and a swirling gray mist filled the chamber once they were all inside. The door slammed itself shut ominously with an echo.

Morin muttered, "Figures..."

Fantasia jumped a bit at the sudden sound, looking over her shoulder at the now-closed door, and then chuckled at Morin's sour remark.

"Yeah, right out of any fantasy story I ever read, too. Now where, oh where..." she mused, walking forward and sharpening her inspection of the place. "is the Great and Powerful Wizard?"

A form coalesces before them out of the hazy mist, looking rather much like a giant wolf-man carrying a sword the size of Rhode Island. "What purpose do you seek within the domain of Garan Kal?" he rumbles.

Fantasia blinked up at the figure that dwarfed her, though size had never really been much of a factor as far as she was concerned. "Umm," she said. "Actually, we came here after hearing rumors that there were odd things happening up here, thinking maybe there was something that we could do."

Well, that and loot, after all what was an adventure without a huge pile of treasure to lug back to town? Hehe.

"What you have heard is true," the figure replied. "The balance has been disrupted, and the sanctity of this place has been violated. Even now my children search for that which was taken from me."

"And what was that?" Fantasia asked, ever curious. "And by whom?" It wasn't every day that someone had the chutzpah to swipe something from a god, they were either really brave or really, incredibly _stupid_.

"Some would consider it to have been a trinket, a mere bauble, but this ancient relic is held sacred by my people, for it was created with the world itself, in the ancient times of over a century and a half ago."

Fantasia winced, imagining the _hell_ the Garou would have gone through to get back a fetish like that... and with good reason. "So, what is it exactly and who do you think stole it?" she asked, "Be more than happy to take a look around for it."

"I know not, for it was taken from this place while my attention was directed elsewhere, to the war in the south. The foolish humans, perhaps not realizing what it was, hoping to sell it for some gold, or perhaps a wizard who realized its value..."

"Or just some wandering numbskull with an eye for something shiny and loot-worthy," Fantasia quipped, then hmmed. "Okay, that gives a few ideas to look at as to _who_ and _where_ , but what exactly would we be looking for? Can you give an idea or show a picture of the thing?"

"It is the Tears of Keolah, a necklace with seven teardrop-shaped blue crystals hanging from it which glow like stars."

"Tears of Keolah, right." Fantasia nodded, somehow restraining the urge to giggle as yet another of the gods of this place having taken part and won in the recent competition. She wrinkled her muzzle in thought after a moment, though. "Jewelry. Okay, that's bad, the stuff could get fenced _anywhere_ , and that doesn't even take into account the possibility of some deranged fanboy snagging it for his private collection and Keolah-shrine. Hrm."

"When Keolah created this world, her tears formed the stars, but seven of them fell upon the earth on this mountain, and formed the crystalline necklace, which we have guarded ever since."

Stranger things had happened, Fantasia knew, the whole cosmology thing from her own point of origin was screwy busy with that sort of thing. Hell, Moonshadow had a right strange history to go with it too, who was she to argue?

"Hmm, okay," she said, "I'll definitely look for it, though can't guarantee any success. Just be glad we're not in New York or you'd never find the pawn shop it ended up in!"

"Then I shall wish you luck in your endeavor. Go with my blessing." The image faded away, and the mist cleared, and the doors swung open again.

Fantasia looked thoughtful as she turned and walked back out of the shrine, puzzling at the problem a bit. There were lots of ways to look at it, ranging from looking for a merchant in town who'd bought the thing to something much more unusual like someone holding a grudge and waiting for just the right moment to steal it.

"YEARGH!" she yelled out, clutching her head as she stepped out into the sunlight.

Morin said, "Well, it appears that we have a quest." He leaned against a nearby scraggly tree.

Goldentail said, "Wow, who would steal something like that?"

Fantasia snorted, starting to pace a bit and tail twitching. "Could be anyone from your average lunkheaded barbarian adventurer with loot in his eyes to someone holding a personal grudge against His Fuzziness and taking advantage of the absence to spirit it away. Ergh."

"And not a Seeker among us. Great," he said. "I suppose that would make it too easy, eh? And we're not going to just go to Keolah and ask her to replace the thing, either."

"Umm, no," Fantasia replied, blinking, not really having any inclination to deal with any more mysterious gods just now. "But I suppose the near area has been scoured by his followers, making it a pretty unlikely place to find anything of interest. Any other towns nearby besides the one we passed through, Goldie?"

Goldentail said, "Sure, the big owns are down the river a good ways, though. There's a few other villages through the mountains, but nothing too major."

"Hmm," Fantasia muttered. "Let's look at it from a gamer's point of view, take the simple route first and assume that it's your average looter rather than a personal vendetta thing. So, you get some goober walking through here, swipes the loot at this rundown shrine, and wants to make a bit of gold off of it. Now, smart one would head for a bigger town, but would they have been seen on the way by his followers? Probably. So..." She shrugged and looked at the others. "I dunno, check out the local villages for rumors and signs of the thing? That'd seem like the most sense to me, unless we happen across some spooky, dark cave with a neon sign pointing to it to welcome adventurers or something."

"And no volcanos!" Morin said emphatically.

Thorn sniggered.

Goldentail said, "Would be easy enough to get a boat down the river to the city, yeah... There aren't too many wizards around that sit around the towns themselves who would pick up something like that..."

"Hmm," Fantasia began again, a quirked grin appearing as she looked over at them. "I could think of a faster way, if you want to hang around a little bit while I work it out..."

"I'm listening..." Morin said, stumbling a bit to catch himself as the tree he was leaning against threatened to break under his weight. "Crap, they don't make trees like they used to."

Fantasia's grin became positively manic as she walks away from them, looking around to make sure she has enough space for what she was thinking of, then closed her eyes. She'd seen plenty of fantasy drawings, even a few at the competition, and she blurred and twisted the image in her mind a bit to customize a few details.

Satisfied, she transformed, mass expanding dramatically and chrome-reflective scales replacing fur. Great wings unfolded as the last touch, leaving a very sleek and polished dragon standing there. She looked down at them, wings spreading experimentally, and grinned.

"Dragon Air, Flight Delta Foxtrot departing soon... well, soon as I figure out what to do with these."

"Oh... my... god..." Morin breathed, staring so wide-eyed that his eyes appeared about to pop out of his face. "Sweeeet."

Fantasia was quite impressed and gleeful about the effect herself, and made a note to give Shazmar a great big hug the next time she saw him. The refinements and color choice were her own doing, of course, but what Glass Walker wouldn't kill for the fully chromed look? The membranes of her wings were nearly translucent as she stretched and curved her neck under to look at them.

"Well, these should work just fine," she said, another delight entirely evident in the glitter of her eyes at Morin's response. "At least in theory. I'm going to have to try it out to see, though. A couple hours max should give me an idea whether it'll work."

Thorn said, "Yes, I suggest you learn how to fly before we go around for a ride first."

Fantasia giggles, though the sound from something like that size is far and away from a normal volume and has a faintly metallic echo. "Do I look like a lupus to be running ahead without a thought in my brain?" she asks teasingly, "Of course I'm going to try it before risking anyone else, silly!"

She then took a thoughtful look around for an area nearby to begin her experiment. The others sat around on the cliff outside the shrine and Morin attempted to conjure them some sandwiches and ended up only conjuring tofu instead. He sighed.

Practice, practice, practice... Maybe it was the long-standing familiarity with that concept, or something in the soul that just yearned to fly, but the session goes remarkably well considering she'd never done anything like it before in her life. The experience was _incredible_ , satisfying the adrenaline junkie part of her quite well, and she alternated between soaring and practicing landing for a while as they ate.

"I do not like tofu," Morin said. "I do hope they have some nice restaurants in this town we're going to. I could do with some grilled salmon, a hamburger, a nice pepperoni pizza, a bowl of clam chowder, some garlic bread, a plate of spaghetti... or something..."

Fantasia thrilled inwardly at the winds beneath her, but stopped to land once again nearby at last, exhilaration writ large in expression and general mood.

"It'll work," she said smugly, laying on the ground and folding her winds, long neck curving to bring her within easy range of the others. "And oh, it'll be fun, trust me!"

"Okay then, if you say so," Morin said.

"Let's go," said Thorn.

They went to climb aboard.

Morin said, "But you don't have seatbelts. You don't meet air safety guidelines."

"Don't make me bite you," Fantasia replied with mock severity, glaring back at him, then grinned. "Besides, any air traffic controller or FAA inspector would be thinking about something a little more important than seatbelts right now..." She pointed to the dozens of long, pointy teeth with one claw as her grin widens.

Thorn pulled Morin up and said, "Come on, I'm sure she won't drop us. She'd never do a thing like that."

"Much," Fantasia replied innocently, donning a shining metallic halo to accessorize the rest of the chrome, then let it drop. "Of course not, just hold on tight and don't lean over the sides. My back should be plenty wide and have lots of ridges and spines to hold onto."

Morin proceeded to hold on for dear life. Thorn chuckled at him. Goldentail looked positively bouncy and excited, but managed to hold still lest she bounce herself right off Fantasia's back.

Fantasia waited till they were all settled, then took off as carefully as she could to give them a chance to get used to the idea. She gained a bit of altitude, then began a slow, lazy circle, head arching back to look at Goldentail.

"Okay, so where's the nearest big town?" Fantasia asked. "Down the river we followed, or another one?"

"Yes, right down along that river, where it converges with another big river."

"Righto." Fantasia grinned.

She turned her head back to find the river... wow, things really looked a lot different this way, even more than just looking out of an airplane! The shimmering ribbon wasn't hard to find, though, and she soared sedately in that direction, watching the land below for any long loops she could just skip over.

Several long miles south of the highland village, she spotted a large city at the confluence of two major rivers, sprawling across them and covering all three banks.

That would definitely seem to be the logical first stop, Fantasia mused, not even all that far away. She started looking around for a place nearby outside town that she could land safely in, not particularly wanting to startle or scare the locals into opening fire on her or anything. Dang it, not an airport in sight! She grinned at the thought, and continued looking.

There was some open farmland to the south of town, at any rate. Although one would imagine the farmers may not like dragons coming and landing in their cornfields, what were they really going to do about it?

Fantasia rumbled quiet laughter and headed for the farmlands, though seeking an area that wasn't immediately filled with growing things if at all possible, or populated by herd animals to go trampling madly about. She had no problem causing havoc and stirring things up, but there just seemed something a bit wrong about tormenting innocent farmfolk. Picking the best place she can find, she headed in to land.


	3. Elves Are Jerks

And so, our lovable menagerie had been wandering around Serriya looking for some ancient artifact called the Tears of Keolah. This might or might not have involved fighting goblins, listening to cryptic old sages, or crawling through lengthy dungeons.

But eventually it had led them pointing toward the western part of the continent, the part inhabited by the first elves/wizards (the two terms seem to be used synonymously), who were later exiled and then de-exiled who went into hiding in the forests around there.

Needless to say, Fantasia had been enjoying the excursion with her usual exuberance, and early on took to adapting her appearance to a more fantasy-oriented seeming. Any D&D group would recognize the highly unrealistic attire she donned, the classic garb of a bard tailored to her own whims from a low and high-cut blouse and vest to form-hugging breeks and high-heeled leather boots.

Mustn't forget the cap with a feather rising jauntily from it, of course, and a mandolin conjured with a bit of paper magic. All in all, the adventure had fallen well within the bounds of her definition of 'very foxy'! As they travel she kept adding verses to an ongoing ballad to chronicle their adventures, each more implausible than the last, and that was what she was toying with as they wended their way toward the elves.

"Elves, wizards... selves, gizzards..." she said aloud, then smirked. "Now how am I supposed to put things in proper heroic form when I have rhymes like that to work with? _Everyone_ knows the adventuring party is inevitably headed into danger when they go tromping boldly into the lairs of wizard and witches, have to get it right!"

Morin said helpfully, "Shelves? Lizards?"

Thorn said, "Why did I agree to come along again?"

Goldentail said, "Maybe these elves know where it's at!"

Shenzel said, "I do hope so."

Fantasia grinned over at Thorn. "You were bored, remember? Sighing and sulking amongst the trees of Torn Elkandu, despondent and deploring the state of affairs. You have to admit this is a lot more fun!" She turned back to humming a few bars, and jotted a few notes in her notebook. "Shelves? Maybe something about gruesome jars and vials to add to ambiance. And lizards? Hmm..." She tapped her pen thoughtfully to her chin. "Of course! What wizard doesn't have a guardian lizard? Not that you'd get much in the way of thanks from the lizard in question for describing them that way, but who's telling the tale here?"

She giggled. They might be coming up on their target, or something to lead them to it, but she still enjoyed the _chase_ more than the catching in any hunt... well, she grinned with a sideways glance, _most_ hunts.

Thorn said, "I don't know, those trees are sounding pretty good right now."

They find a small village of tree-dwelling elves nestled amongst the forest, so well concealed that they didn't even notice it until they were on top of it and several bows ended up being pointed at them. Fantasia blinked and made like a rock, warily eyeing the array of sharp and pointy things directed at them.

"Uhhh, maybe a little," she admitted to Thorn, then put on her best welcoming grin as she took a step forward. "Hello there! Just a peaceful group of wanderers, that's us, wouldn't hurt a fly. I don't suppose you'd consider not shooting us, would you?"

"You have intruded upon our territory," said one irate pointy-ears. "You are strangers, outsiders."

Thorn said, "Uh, me and Morin are elves too... well, kind of..." She pointed helpfully to her ears.

"Yep!" Fantasia agreed energetically. "They're half-elves, and I've _known_ a lot of elves, and we're terribly sorry for having stumbled accidentally onto your turf without a proper introductory howl or anything. We really didn't and don't mean any harm," she finished with her most-brilliant and charming smile.

"You're outsider traitor elves! You must die even more!" They promptly started shooting at them.

Fantasia yiped and dove for cover, hopefully with the rest of her companions having the sense to do the same unlike that goofy werewolf before. Apparently her first reaction to a conflict that she had no reason to pursue was to get the hell away from it, fast! The thought of using her shapeshifting to scare the elves off hadn't even crossed her mind at this point.

Her companions were all sensible and not suicidally aggressive, and they dodged and ducked for cover, although Morin was too slow and got an arrow in the butt. There were, after all, a lot more elves than them, too.

Getting to a little cover, Fantasia turned to the task of getting her friends out of the way of danger... out of sight, out of mind. Invisibility had always been one of her favorite tricks.

They ended up having to scatter out of the village entirely and regroup some ways away. The elves at least didn't follow.

Fantasia was used to running, so wasn't winded in the least as they regrouped, and proceeded to check on her friends, "Is everyone okay?" She was a little irritated at the rude reception, but she couldn't _really_ blame the elves too much.

Morin said, "I think so... ow!" He felt around and found the shaft sticking out of his arse.

A giggle surfaced without any hope of suppressing as Fantasia looked over at his reply and saw the source of his discomfort. "Oh, poor Morin," she said, though she was clearly finding more humor than indignation at the moment, more just relieved that nothing more serious came out of it than what would heal quickly enough.

"Ahhrgh, get it out of me!" Morin said, whimpering pathetically.

Thorn sniggered uncontrollably.

Fantasia looked over at Thorn. "Oh be nice," she said, though stifling a giggle of her own through a monumental force of will. She walked over to help the poor guy, luckily she was familiar with all sorts of injuries and how to deal with them through years of dealing with shapeshifters who regularly find themselves in all sorts of nasty situations. Sit-uations, that would be a problem... the thought releasing a choked giggle.

Shenzel commented, avoiding commenting on Morin's predicament, "It appears that the natives are not friendly."

Yeaaaah, you could say that," Fantasia agreed, glad of the subject change to focus on. "I wonder if there's another way to get where we're going? Flying's always an option, of course," she said hopefully, the sheer joy she'd found in the pastime could quickly become addictive.

"That depends on knowing where we're supposed to be going in the first place," Thorn said. "Those wise old sages weren't particularly ... clear."

"Blech, I know," Fantasia nodded, then hmmmmed. "Well, between Goldy and me, it would be a snap to disguise the rest of you as full elves so we could go back and re-introduce ourselves, maybe get some more information."

"They weren't being particularly friendly about elves either, from what they said. Traitor elves, outsiders?" Thorn said.

"Oh, I just assumed they were talking about half-elves, for some reason," Fantasia replied with a shrug, it wasn't like she'd had a lot of time to think about it while diving away from the sudden storm of pointy things. "Could always do a bit of scouting to see if there's anything unusual in the area."

"I don't look like a half-elf," Thorn pointed out. "Hmm. So the Tears might be in this part of the planet, and they're certainly too aggressive to just ask them. So that leaves sneaking in and hoping they don't notice."

"Sneaking is a specialty." Fantasia grinned, then turned a fish eye on Morin. "Though you're about as stealthy as a bull in a Radio Shack. Hmm..." She bit her lower lip thoughtfully.

Morin said, "I'll stay here, thanks. You go see what you can find."

Fantasia snorted and shook her head decisively. "Nuh-uh, rule of horror movies and other dangerous settings number one: Never, ever, _ever_ split up, under any circumstances. I think I can cook something up to keep you quiet." She grinned.

"I'm scared," Morin said. "And this isn't a horror movie!"

"All the more reason to stick together," Fantasia soothed. "There's safety in numbers, right? And what would an adventuring party be without its wizard, anyway?"

"Technically I'm more scared of what _you_ might do than them," Morin pointed out.

"Oh, okay," Fantasia replied, her expression unreadable as she turned away, then continued in a brisk, business-like fashion, "Alright, that'll work then. The rest of us can sneak through and see what's to be found, just what these rude little cookie-makers are hiding."

Morin said, "I'm kidding. Let's go." He snickered softly.

Fantasia smiled a little, then shifted down to her smaller foxish form. She thought about going with a sleek black version to make a Fox-111 stealth fox-fighter, but restrained the urge without any real effort. No reason to go with the invisibility, since most of them would be animals anyway, but she did apply a modified version of it to Morin to include smell and sound as well.

She trotted to the edge of the forest and looked in, then back over her shoulder to see if she was missing or forgetting anything before trekking onward.

Not, of course, like normal wolves and panthers frequently strolled through the village. But their little excursion ended pretty disastrously when they got tangled up in some magical nets and tossed into a little tree-prison before they could even do anything.

Fantasia blinked wide-eyed as she looked around the little prison, the events that led up to them being there more than a bit blurry in her mind. 'I didn't even get drunk!' she wailed inwardly at the injustice of it all.

"Oh, that worked well," Morin said wryly.

The room was built of solid wood and leaves, with a little barred window looking out over the village, but was strongly warded.

The little fox stood up and shook herself out, fur ruffling and sending little bits of forest debris scattering. Fantasia mrfed in discontent, then shapeshifted back to her human form. "Yeah, about as well as letting a lupus choose the night's target." She sighed and settled down cross-legged. "On the plus side, they tossed us in a cell instead of the shooting approach this time."

"I'd just open us a portal out," Morin said. "But the place is warded up pretty tight. I wonder what they want us for?"

"Elves don't tend to be real big on the visitor-flambe," Fantasia said. "Or at least they're not anywhere I've seen, and I doubt they're much different here. Other than that, no clue, but not sure I want to stick around to find out."

She shrugged her pack off and started digging through it as she thought of the various ways of getting out of a jam.

Goldentail said, "Well, I'm sure they'll tell us soon enough..."

Thorn said, "Before they shoot us?"

"We can stick around to find out." Fantasia grinned. "Though I'm not sure I want to trust to their ideas of what would be 'fair' treatment for interlopers in their territory considering they shot first last time. Maybe the guards were exceptions, yeah, that's it!" She smirks and keeps digging.

"I'll just try to get through the wards.. maybe some focused antimagic will do it..." Morin muttered.

"This would be easier if we knew the limits of the warding," Fantasia mused, stopping her digging to take a thoughtful look around. "I wonder just how strong it is? Hmm... blah." She made a face. "Then again, if we _do_ break out of here, we'd blow _any_ chance that they aren't looking to stretch our hides on a wall and might be useful. Why don't we wait and see, then make a break if things go wrong?"

"Oh, alright," Morin said, sighing and looking out the window.

Shortly, a shimmering holographic face appeared in one corner. "Outsiders! Strangers in our territory! Intruders upon our grounds! What have you to say for yourselves?"

"We really don't mean any harm," Fantasia replied, pushing herself up and turning to face the... well, face. "We're on a quest and some not-so-sage sage advice threw us in this direction. I'm sorry if we got off on the wrong foot."

"You have intruded upon our territory and attempted to sneak in again when told to leave."

Fantasia had the grace to look embarrassed at that, though it wasn't for the reasons that the viewer would probably expect... getting _caught_ was the real point, a big mark on her record!

"Well yes, that's true," she admitted. "But you have to admit that getting shot at without any real chance to explain anything isn't likely to inspire honesty."

"Therefore, you shall be cast into the Sacred Grove and left to the judgment of the Goddess of Nature, Naranna!"

"But wait!" Fantasia wailed, scrabbling suddenly for anything that would get them out of this without running afoul of a god to these people who were clearly more than a little bonkers. "Can't we just call it even? You shot at us, hurt one, and then we ended up in here. All's good, right? Just let us out and we'll mosey on our way!"

The face vanished with a puff of smoke, and their surroundings warped and twisted. Suddenly they found themselves sitting in a tranquil glade with sun-touched leaves, and a small spring bubbling up from a circle of rocks at the center.

"Well so much for reason," Fantasia muttered, and backed toward the others as she looked around. "And this is where something leaps out at the heroes to perform some gruesome test with plenty of blood and gore sure to earn an R rating at the least."

Some birds chirped sweetly in the trees overhead.

Morin brushed himself off self-consciously. "Um... Nice place," he said. "So where's the big nasties?"

Fantasia blinked and looked around. "This _is_ a bit anti-climactic," she agreed and went to take a look at the spring.

The spring bubbled up crystal clear, clean water cheerfully. Some butterflies fluttered past.

Thorn said, "Um... I hate to jinx us, but..."

"Don't say it," Fantasia winced, then stalked toward the edge of the clearing. "Let's get out of here before someone remembers the welcoming committee."

There was a flicker of shadow and light from the edge of the grove. A whisper of music. Some chipmunks stopped to look at them. The spring glowed for a moment and a feminine voice from nowhere in particular said, "Hmm, what have we here?"

"Too late," Fantasia meeped and froze in place, then turned very slowly to look around the clearing. "Uhhh, just took a wrong turn at Albuquerque, we'll be on our way now, if you don't mind?"

"Hmm... Interesting... Do the elves presume to use me to do their dirty work? Hmph."

Well _that_ was certainly an interesting statement, enough to perk Fantasia's mental ears. "Well, they did say something about Naranna," she offered tentatively. "And the impression wasn't exactly good, not after they were shooting at us to begin with."

"I am Naranna," the voice continued. "They presume overmuch. No harm will come to you."

"To be honest," Fantasia admitted reluctantly as she walked back further into the grove and looked more carefully around. "They just said something about turning us over for 'judgment', maybe it just _sounded_ a bit sinister from the confines of a cell. We really don't mean any harm, we're just looking for something that one of the gods here had stolen."

"What is it that you seek?" the voice continued liquidly.

"A necklace," Fantasia replied and generated a copy of the image that they'd been shown a while back. "The Tears of Keolah," she managed to restrain a short laugh at the silly fantasy name, largely due to the fact of talking to something that was considered a god here... didn't pay to annoy the local pantheon.

There was a rippling shimmer in the air for a moment, light glistening off the water, and the voice said, "They lie and conceal. They fear that you will take from them what was wrongly stolen."

Mental ears perked even further at that, and Fantasia replied eagerly, "You mean the elves have it?"

"They hide that which you seek. But not amongst themselves," the voice replied. "Seek further within."

"Seek further within?" Fantasia asked, puzzled at that since it sounded like something a huckster outside a mall shop would say to get people to go into the store in question. "Within what?"

The light was already fading away even as she said it, leaving only silence and birdsong.

"ARGH!" Fantasia exclaimed. "What _is_ it with sages and gods around this crazy place? You'd think they'd eaten the 'Cryptic Dialog' supplement for D &D."

"Well.. At least we know we're on the right track," Thorn said optimistically.

Fantasia wasn't so easily-mollified, however, and returned to her hybrid form to gave a raspberry to the air. She felt remarkably better afterwards, though, and grinned. "Now to figure out the riddle."

"So," Shenzel said. "They're not hiding it in their village, but somewhere else?"

"It's hidden, but not amongst themselves, and within..." Fantasia mused, idly scratching under her muzzle. "A cave? Something else?"

"A cave, how cliched," Morin commented. "Probably another one of those maze-like dungeons full of nasty traps and guarded by monsters."

Fantasia shrugged. "Dunno, that's all I can think of offhand since she said that they didn't have it hidden amongst themselves. Only other thing I could think of would be some weird little pocket-realm that they have access to."

"So, let's see if there's any inexplicable dungeons around here," Morin said cheerfully, rubbing his ass unconsciously.

"And try to avoid running into any more unfriendly natives," Fantasia added with a bit of a grin before turning back to the immediate problem. "Okay, so dank and dark dungeon, held fast at the heart of a mysterious cave or ancient ruin... Anyone got a metal detector?"

Thorn said, "Don't look at me."

Goldentail said,"Let's try those rocky hills on the edge of the forest."

"Sounds like a plan!" Fantasia agreed and headed off to make the jaunt toward said rocky hills.

The rocky hills were rocky and hilly. Some little openings that might lead off into cave entrances could be seen along their sides.

"Ooh, let's split up and check them!" Fantasia said with mock enthusiasm, then smirked and trotted off to poke her muzzle into the first of them, prepared to give someone a Look if they took her seriously about splitting up.

The first couple led off to dead ends, but the third went further on in and reached a solid carved wooden door with animals on it.

"Well, now we're getting somewhere," Thorn commented.

"What adventure would be complete without a dungeon crawl?" Fantasia grinned and advanced on the door to start exploring the place, but paused just before trying to open it to look at the others. "May want to put on your Angry Eyes, just in case we start getting some results from the random encounter tables."

Morin snickered softly.


	4. The Obvious Dungeon

Thorn just raised an eyebrow at the excessively ornate door set into the hillside. "Let's see what's on the other side," Thorn said.

Fantasia nodded and went to open it and took a look inside. As she opened the door, there was an ominous _click_ and suddenly they were engulfed in flames for a moment. Fantasia yelped and leapt back from the doorway, patting frantically at a few patches of singed fur.

"Oh yeah, should have seen _that_ coming," she muttered/ "I don't suppose anyone's familiar with dark ages traps? I'd be fine with something other than stone age, but... sheesh, I didn't invest in any Disable Traps skill."

Morin coughed for a moment and said, "Well. This is off to a good start..."

Fantasia smirked. "Well, I'll take that as a 'no', hmm..." She started thinking, probably a dangerous thing as her companions doubtless recognized by now, then grinned an equally dangerous grin. "Remind me to thank Shazmar the next time we're in Torn Elkandu."

She then proceeded to transform into the combination of a Cyberdog from her own universe and a more traditional metal golem. Fantasia stood about nine feet tall now and looked more like a fully-chromed Garou than anything else.

Morin blinked and looked her over. "Well, that might work... but what about the rest of us?"

"What about it?" she asked, rolling her shoulders and with a faint whine resounding somewhere in the area. "Every party needs someone to spring traps, don't they?" She chuckled deeply and walked back to throw the door open, warning. "Just stay back a bit."

Morin decided to stay back a little more than a bit and took up the rear. Thorn smirked and followed after Goldentail, followed by Shenzel.

Fantasia continued on with more than her usual level of confidence, apparently falling prey to the 'bigger is better' philosophy for the moment. She headed through the door and on to whatever lay beyond.

As she went on, a wide pit promptly opened up under her feet. Paws. Whatever.

Reflex was a hard thing to overwrite with temporary confidence, and Fantasia yelps in surprise as the floor vanished beneath her. She scrabbled for purchase as she began to drop, whether at the lip of the pit or by digging in with metal claws into the side of the pit.

With a bit of a scraping sound, she momentarily found herself thirty feet down. At least it wasn't a poison spiked pit too, just an ordinary annoying pit. But still. Clearly someone wanted to keep people out of here.

Spikes really weren't that worrying to her, but Fantasia really, really wanted to have a 'chat' with whoever designed this little dungeon. Geez, what were they trying to do, _kill_ their visitors or something? She tried to still the flood of adrenaline, then very, _very_ carefully starts trying to work her way upward, checking _each_ clawhold before moving to the next.

After some while, she managed to climb out of the pit. "Are you okay?" called Morin from halfway down the corridor.

"Yeah," Fantasia panted from where she's laying at the edge of the pit, and went on after a minute. "Good thing I'm used to weird stuff happening." She climbed to her feet and pointed down at the now-obvious trap. "Watch your step, the last one's a doozy."

Thorn snickered softly. "Well, looks like we should be able to go around it without much difficulty now that we know where it is."

Fantasia regained her composure quickly and looked down at herself thoughtfully, experiencing a new respect for what she'd gotten in return for her wish and her tail wagging unconsciously with pleasure at the thought. She grinned back at them. "Just call me Indie... I _am_ the dog right now, after all."

She moved to pass the pit and continue onward a bit more cautiously. She managed to avoid springing the next trap, which was just as well as it appeared to be a vat of acid. The tunnels wound off in several directions from here.

"They are _serious_ about keeping people out of here, aren't they?" Fantasia muttered, but a spark of greed springs to life at the thought of the goodies that they had to be hiding down here. She wouldn't have a single qualm about doing some looting on the way with the rude reception! "Hmm," she looked at the passages leading on and picked one at random to follow.

Down this next corridor, they came to a room in which they were ambushed by a small dragon with smooth, pale skin and red eyes.

"Oh, look, an albino dragon, how cu--ahh!" Thorn ducked behind cover as the dragon breathed at them.

Fantasia did her best to avoid whatever kind of breath the dragon spewed out, then _pounced_. She really must be feeling more confident, actually getting into physical combat.

The poor dragon didn't stand a chance, whimpering softly as Fantasia landed on it. Some would probably expect her to be squeamish or at least reluctant to kill... they'd be disappointed or shocked. Fantasia knew how much trouble came out of leaving the bad guys or critters running around alive behind, and made sure of it with practical efficiency.

"Traps, dragons," she muttered. "What else is down here?" She looked around.

"Hopefully, what we're looking for," Thorn mused.

Continuing on, they reached a wide area filled with molten lava, with large flat rocks floating over it back and forth. Fantasia had to stop and blink at the addition of a lava-filled room.

"Man, someone had _way_ too much time on their hands!" Fantasia said.

She'd head cautiously out to try and pass along the path of islands. The floating stones drifted back and forth between several larger fixed stones. Far across the lava lake, a faintly glowing door could be seen.

Morin says, "Um..."

"Come on," Fantasia prodded, grinning as she shifted to something else entirely, dropping much lower to the ground and becoming lizard-like in appearance with coal-black eyes and glowing reddish-orange skin... a salamander. "Haven't you ever played video games? Just think 3D! I'll watch to help if needed."

She stepped close to the lava and carefully tested it with a claw. The lava was definitely molten hot.

Morin looked at the drifting rocks dubiously. "Sure I get the concept, but _why_?"

"To get to the other side, naturally," Fantasia replied with a hissed chuckle. "Door, over there, shoo!"

She slipped into the lava and began swimming sinuously through it, though kept her head and a stretch of neck clear of the molten rock to keep it somewhat cooler should a hand, or head, be needed. The sensation was really, _really_ weird!

"Well I know that, but why is this all here?" Morin wondered. He sighed and when one of the rocks came close enough, he and the others jumped onto it.

"Why is _any_ of this here?" Fantasia countered, keeping pace with the rock, enjoying the flush of heat and thrill of moving through the thick 'water', "I'm really wondering if one of the gods wasn't a gamer geek in a former life with all the fantasy game stereotypes we've seen since coming here."

"Somehow it would not surprise me." They hopped over to the next rock.

Fantasia circled the rock to keep within easy distance in case anyone looked to be losing their balance and offered a boost back toward safety.

"That being the case, that glowy door over there looks pretty ominous," she said. "No telling what kind of trap could be called up with a bit of fantasy magic. Nasty stuff.... but that's also where the best loot tended to be hidden, too."

"Well, only one way to find out, eh?" They manage to make it there safely.

Somewhat reluctantly, Fantasia crawled out of the lava on the far side, her own hide not radiating nearly as much heat as would otherwise be expected after a molten bath and the rock sluicing off like water.

"Mmm." She looked at the door narrowly. It was a large metallic door, carven with faintly glowing bluish runes, with a brassy colored knob and hinges around the silverish doors.

Morin looked over the thing pensively. "Hmm."

Fantasia pointed a sharp claw at the thing. "I do _not_ trust any part of that door, it looks like it's just _waiting_ to dump whatever kind of energy it's got stored away into the first sap to touch it. Now, I could probably figure out a form to soak it, _if_ I knew what it was..."

She shifted back to her hybrid form to take a closer look at it. There was always the gift 'Open Seal', but would it even work here?

Morin said, "Well, I could try an antimagic buffer in case something goes wrong I suppose."

"Let me try a gift," Fantasia said. "No idea if it'll even work here, but it was really, _really_ useful back home for getting through _any_ kind of seal, be it mechanical or mystical. It's worth a shot, there's no telling if the rules here are close enough."

It was a Ragabash's best friend for getting into or out of trouble, making it impossible to keep them in or out, and she gave it a try. The door was opened, but the runes made a blinding flash as something else was triggered.

Morin said, "Agh, my eyes!"

Fantasia was looking right at the door, concentrating on activating the gift, and the flash caught her flat out as well. She yelped in surprise and pain, and staggered back from it, only remembering at the last that there was a big pit of lava behind them and putting on the skids as she rubbed her eyes.

Thankfully, there didn't appear to be anything big, nasty, and with more teeth than brain cells waiting to eat them while blinded on the other side of the door.

Goldentail recovered first and said, "It's okay. Nothing's moving in there."

Fantasia blinked against the after-image of the door still lingering ghost-like in her vision. "If that was the weak version, I don't want to know what they _meant_ to happen."

They were lucky something _hadn't_ been waiting, living or otherwise, since it would have been dead easy to shove them all back into the lava... she shuddered at the thought.

"Let's see what they were hiding so well, then," Thorn said, then blinked a bit more. "After I stop seeing spots in front of my eyes at least."

Fantasia took the cheap route out by shapeshifting back to the golem-esque form, repairing the lingering effects. "I'll take point," she said and stepped cautiously through the door.

There was a hallway beyond the door, leading to a circular chamber with a dais in the center, with a pedestal containing a glowing blue crystal box.

Fantasia proceeded with _extreme_ caution, recognizing the moment when every gaming group would run forward in a rush to get to the loot first and then fall prey to the final trap of a demented DM. She paused at the edge of the chamber and took a careful look around, and tipped her muzzle to take a good sniff of the air for signs of anything unusual.

There didn't appear to be anything immediately about to jump out and eat, incinerate, electrocute, maim, maul, poison, blow up, ensnare, impale, or otherwise inconvenience them.

"Right," Fantasia snorted, not believing _that_ for a minute as she walked slowly over toward the pedestal, testing each step carefully. She was laughing somewhere inside, remembering the early morning game sessions of yesteryear where Shredder was running them through one sadistic campaign or another. The box was tempting, but she'd still inspect it closely before trying anything.

She noticed some tiny runes carved along the edge of the box, around the opening. They glowed faintly and would doubtless do something like the door did.

"This was a lot less dangerous with a good HP roll," Fantasia muttered and narrowed her eyes this time before trying the gift again. Of course, her mind capered and taunted, it'd probably do something _else_ this time.

It worked, and definitely triggered something in doing so. Electricity erupted from the box, shooting out toward her. Figured, she quipped in the instant as she tried to react and dive out of the way. She had no idea whether it would even affect her, but reflexive actions didn't really care much about thinking anyway. It did sting a good deal, but she managed to avoid the worst of it. Morin was thankfully keeping a wiiiide berth here.

Fantasia pushed away from the floor where she'd dived. "Mind if I smoke?" She couldn't help but giggle, noticing wisps of smoke drifting up from her metalloid skin.

After a minute to catch her breath, she stood up and went to take a look into the box that she hoped was now safely trap free and wouldn't have any other nasty surprises attached to it... Inside the box, she saw a necklace with several blue teardrop-shaped crystals, faintly glowing and sparkling with their own light.

"I think we found it," Fantasia crooned and reached in to take the necklace from the box and get a better look at it, nary once remembering the classic Indiana Jones sequence involving a golden idol and a big rock and roll chase.

It did not eat, incinerate, electrocute, maim, maul, poison, blow up, ensnare, impale, or otherwise inconvenience her when she pulled it out, thankfully. It just hung there glittering.

"Ooh, shiiiiny," Fantasia remarked facetiously, then shook her head with a grin. "I'm sure His Fuzziness will be glad to get you back, though." She laid it back in the box for now, closed the lid, and took the box instead to tuck under one arm before heading back for the door. "Got it," she said brightly, "Anyone want to check the other passages for loot?"

"Um... That's a trick question, right?" Morin said.

Fantasia laughed. "Of course not! What's a little chaos and mayhem among friends?"

"Okay, fine, but if there's any more molten lava or the like we're leaving," he said firmly.

"Awww, you're no fun," Fantasia teased. "But I _suppose_ that's only fair."

She grinned and headed back out of the room, shapeshifting briefly to her hybrid form to get to her backpack and store the box safely. They get back across the lava without difficulty once again, and went to check out the next hallway. This one seemed to be blocked by a large, round boulder.

Fantasia looked at the roadblock and hmmed. "Hey hero, think you can take care of this?" she asked with a glance back at Morin. Otherwise... there was probably something that'd be good at chewing through rock, hmm...

Morin said, "Hmm, that's an awful lot of matter to blast." He put his hands against it thoughtfully. It rolled forward slightly.

Fantasia looked over his shoulder... from several feet up, and noticing the movement asked, "Think it's loose enough to move, or are you doing a bit more to it?"

"I think it would move..." Morin said, giving it a harder push. It rolled forward half an inch. "Of course, I'm a weakling."

Fantasia grinned and shooed him aside so she could step up and give the boulder a bit of a nudge herself. She was _really_ starting to appreciate all the things that the expanded shapeshifting opened up to her.

The boulder rolled forward easily. After moving it ahead a good several feet, she could see a better view of the area. It appeared to be a wide region filled with boulders and pits. Morin groaned faintly.

Chuckling at Morin's reaction, Fantasia stepped out around the boulder and started testing a way to cross the room safely. Judging by the positioning of the pits and boulders, it would likely require pushing the boulders into the pits to get across, barring extreme property damage.

Fantasia had a feeling it was going to take something like that, the setup of this dungeon reminding her naggingly of a video game of some sort, and started puzzling at the best route to take and set to work.

It was Morin, however, who figured out the best way to manage it. "Here, put that boulder into that hole, and that one there, and yeah..." he said, gesturing wildly as he describes a way across.

Fantasia smirked but didn't make the snarky comment that rose about his sudden change of enthusiasm for the project, instead setting to the task at his direction. Wouldn't be the first time, she chuckled with wicked inward delight.

After a good deal of shoving rocks around, they managed to cross over through the short hallway at the far side of the room. It led into another room, with lifelike statues of animals, each of them carrying bags of coins and jewels.

"Now _this_ is more like it!" Fantasia grinned broadly, rubbing her hands together with the avarice born of being raised as a Glass Walker. She didn't do an immediate dive like Uncle Scrooge into his money bin, though the image _does_ cross her mind, instead checking the approach carefully before touching _anything_.

There was a veritable zoo of statues in this room. A wolf, giraffe, elephant, moose, horse, ox, wolverine, bear, fox, ostrich, lion, and crocodile each bore their own treasures. Fantasia was more than a little suspicious of the menagerie presenting itself, and idly wonders if they were individually animated or all at once...

She chuckled, looking over the piles of treasure and chose one that looked particularly tasty to test her gamer's paranoia on by plucking a piece of loot free. As to be expected, when she removed the treasure, the creature who was guarding it sprung to life and attacked her.

At least she'd been expecting it, and Fantasia grinned in vindication as it sprung to life and dropped the piece of treasure for now as she leapt back. "Ah-hah!" She'd go on the attack afterward, not the least bit inconvenienced by her confirmed suspicions... this was _loot_ after all!

She managed to evade the creature's attacks for the most part. Although it was aggressive and looked alive, it didn't actually leave its pedestal, and after a moment it turned back to stone again.

"Oh, now _that_ is convenient!" Fantasia grinned with unabashed delight at the realization that the thing wouldn't leave its perch and started working on a reasonable method to extract the goodies from each of them at a safe range, taking into account their size and likely reach. Sometimes it really _paid_ to be a Glass Walker!

After some effort and a little creativity, she managed to extract the coins and jewels from the animal statues without harm. Morin watched from a safe distance in amusement, although Thorn and Shenzel and Goldentail were apparently playing go fish.

Fantasia had an image of Daffy Duck pop into mind and crowed over the pile of loot. "I'm rich! A happy miser! Bwaha!"

The potential monetary value was a secondary concern, really, she had more than she could ever use back home, but it was the principle of the thing! She hoped those elves _choked_ on it. Nyah! She shifted to get at her pack again and scoops the stuff into it for storage and sharing out later.

Morin said, "Illogical puzzles randomly concealing treasure... what a weird place."

Thorn looked up and said, "We ready to go yet? Go fish."

"Was that the only other passage?" Fantasia asked, not remembering offhand in the happy glow of avarice and gloating, and couldn't resist adding. "Those poke-happy elves are gonna turn _puce_ when they realize their hoard's missing."

"What color is puce again?" Morin asked.

Thorn said, "That was the only--"

Morin interrupted, saying, "There was one other side passage."

Thorn said, "Oh, right, of course, silly me to forget."

"Neat!" Fantasia replied happily, dreams of plunder dancing in her twisted little mind and the grand jest of it all, and shifted back to the golem as she headed back to find the final passage. "Puce is a... really ugly color," she remarked offhandedly as they move on. "Pinkish-purplish-ickish color, ought to go real nicely with their tights."

The third tunnel appeared to have a large number of plants for an underground dungeon. Vines clung to the walls and moss covered the floor, and at the far end of the room, a giant corpse flower was letting off a terrible stench.

Morin went, "Ugh."

"You think _you_ got it bad?" Fantasia retched, covering her nose, then said, "Stand back..." and shifted back to the salamander to remove the potential dangers of the plants and the _reek_ of the flower.

Thorn sighed and said, "Here, let me handle it..." She raised a hand and forced the stinking flower to close up tight.

Fantasia sneezed at the remnant of the stink, accidentally spouting a tongue of flame. "Ugh, how could they put something like _that_ in here? Ick." The form had its advantages, she supposed, her body temperature altering to bring a shimmer of heat haze around the serpentine coils before cooling again. "Neat," she murmured and scurried across the cavern floor to head onward.

Thorn cleared the way past the plants, through which they emerged into a strange cathedral-like cavern with nine fountains, eight at the sides and corners and one large one in the middle. The fountains each had ornate statues of mythical beings.

Fountains, hmm, probably not such a great place to be a salamander, Fantasia decided, and returned to the golem yet again to go take a look at one of the fountains.

Mermaid, centaur, minotaur, dragon, unicorn, griffin, pegasus, hippogriff, mark the fountains around the edges. The one in the center had a tall man with a long, flowing beard, holding a trident and bearing a crown. The trident and crown appeared to be metallic rather than stone, and shimmer with a faint blue light.

Fantasia looked at the fountains uneasily, especially the one in the center that was glowing a bit. "Umm, yeah. Maybe we've done enough for the day. I'm not sure exactly what's going on in here, but I have a reeeeeally bad feeling about it."

"You may have a point," Morin agreed, looking around warily.

"We'll leave this one alone, I think," Fantasia said, then grinned. "Though I think it wouldn't hurt to make a little stop before we head back to see His Fuzziness, leave a gift for Naranna for her help and as a thanks for not doing anything nasty to my favorite hide."

She turned to head back for the entryway. The others turned to follow readily, shrugging. "Sure thing," Morin said.

All in all a good trip, once they got past the whole crazy elf thing! Fantasia hummed to herself as they made their way back out, working out the rhythm for the next section of the ballad. Once outside, she'd return to her hybrid form and dig through the treasure they found until finding a suitable gem or jewel, then look for a reference point that'd lead back to Naranna's glade. With a little effort, she managed to find the way back to the sacred glade again, followed by the others.

Morin said, "I wonder what the deal was with those fountains... Guess we'll never find out. Just as well, considering what else was there!"

"I'm a Ragabash, not a Theurge," Fantasia replied. "Don't get me wrong, I love a puzzle as much as the next person, but I'm not sure I want to take the chance of getting into _too_ much trouble over it."

Considering the trouble she _was_ willing to leap into, that had to say something! She approached the spring at the center of the glade and slipped the gem beneath the water to rest at the bottom, glittering in the sun.

It never hurt to stay on the good side of local spirits, she knew well, and it suited her nature well to leave the gem as both a 'thanks' and a possible trinket that the elves might find and go into a tizzy over. Hehe. The water glowed faintly and gently as the gem sank to the bottom, a faint echo of music whispering through the grove.

Morin said, "Whatever. So what are you doing now?"

"Whatever," Fantasia replied mockingly and stuck her tongue out at him, then grinned as she straightened as she moved away from the spring, offering a real explanation. "Just a little thank you to the local Goddess of Nature, never hurts to be polite and stay on the good side of the local spirits. And speaking of, we should get that necklace back to His Fuzziness when everyone's ready to take a flight."

"Sure, let's go," Morin said, looking back to the others, who are apparently playing rock-paper-scissors now. "They look like they're getting bored."

Fantasia smirked and walked away to get the room she needed to revert to the dragon form that she truly _loved_.

"I'll make sure to make their flight interesting, then," she rumbled after the transformation. "Gaia forbid I let people get _bored_ and complacent!"

She laid down and looked pointedly in their direction. Thorn looked positively terrified, but she did climb aboard with the others. Morin snickered softly.

Fantasia wouldn't be _too_ cruel, and the takeoff was relatively sedate, not a loop or dive in sight, but she did let the wind fill her wings for height and add a few moments of 'excitement'.

Shenzel about clung for dear life to her back. Morin was a bit more laid-back about it, and Goldentail unabashedly exclaimed, "Whee!" as they soared off into the distance.


	5. The Hard-Earned Reward

Fun was the whole point, keep things interesting for yourself and others, and Fantasia took that part of being a Ragabash seriously... at least as seriously as she took _anything_ at least.

The flight back was designed to emphasize that life-imperative, with just enough energy added to maneuvers to ensure that Shenzel and Thorn wouldn't be bored _this_ time around. A draconic grin was a disturbing thing, and Fantasia was sporting a broad one as she settled neatly to the ground at last on the remote mountaintop where this little venture began.

"Thank you for flying Air-fox, please return all trays to their upright positions and exit in a calm and orderly fashion. Have a nice day," she said cheerfully, wings furling out of the way.

Shenzel and Thorn looked slightly disturbed as they finally landed, and wishing that they had been equipped with airsickness bags. "Let's... stay firmly on the ground for the time being I think," Thorn commented.

Fantasia snickered, the sound changing radically in timbre as she shifted back to her hybrid form and pranced over to playfully lick Thorn on the cheek. "Maybe, maybe not." Grinning, she danced away, the euphoria of soaring still singing in her veins, but managed to come back to earth after a moment and dug out the box that had the necklace in it.

Goldentail hopped along cheerfully in the general direction of the temple of Garan Kal.

Morin chuckled softly and said, "Hey, I don't mind..."

Fantasia headed for the temple, humming cheerfully to herself. She really didn't have any idea why she'd gone on this adventure to begin with, there really wasn't any sane reason to it, but that sort of minor detail had never stopped her in the past and wasn't likely to matter in the future either. It had been fun, and it would make one of the local spirits... or whatever they were... happy. All to the good.

Morin paused a little hesitantly at the entrance to the temple, remembering what happened last time, but it didn't last long. "I wonder if he's paying attention or we should knock or ring a bell or something..."

"My grandma what big ears and nose you have!" Fantasia chirped brightly as her only reply, and entered the temple without the least hesitation. They'd done His Fuzziness a favor, after all, and without any favor asked in return, that would earn them a little leeway. "Hellooooo!" she called out, turning near the center of the building. "Knock knock!"

A misty fog filled the room again, and a lupine form emerged from the mist. "You have returned," said an echoy, masculine voice. At least the door didn't seal itself shut this time, either.

"Of course!" Fantasia replied, grinning as she walks toward the mist and held out the box, snapping the cover open to show the necklace nestled within. "Brought you a souvenir from the trip, too, I hope you like it. I had a tough time picking one out, but I didn't think the pink bunny slippers were quite _you_."

He gave a flicker of a smirk or smile and went to take the box from her. "Excellent. You have done well. I do believe that this deserves some sort of reward." He waved a hand, and a door to the right opened. "Just a small token of my appreciation." He set the necklace into a secure niche, raised wards around it, then vanished.

"Well, wasn't really looking for a _reward_ ," Fantasia remarked, thinking about the small fortune stashed away in her pack, then rationalized, "But hey, wouldn't want to sound ungrateful or anything, right?" She grinned over at her companions and went to see what was behind Door Number Two...

Down the hallway, she found a small fortune in weapons and armor, but most of it was securely behind wards. One small dagger, however, lay unwarded on a pedestal. The blade was about six inches long and engraved with runes, and two sapphires were set into the hilt which was shaped vaguely like a wolf's head, so that they looked like eyes.

Now that looked interesting, and what fox could possibly resist at least taking a look at something magical? It would take a far stronger willpower than Fantasia possessed, that's for sure! "Oh, you can never have too many fetishes," she breathed, ducking to take an eye-level look at it, then reached out to gingerly lift it from its place.

Morin just chuckled softly. The sapphire eyes sparkled slightly as if looking at her, but nothing bad happened.

"Have to decide what to do with _this_ ," Fantasia crooned, appreciating the quality and craftsmanship a moment more before heading back toward the door. She gave the warded items a thoughtful glance, but decided that discretion was called for when dealing with an active spirit/god being in the area... even if the idea of magical stuff was enough to make her whiskers twitch.

Morin peered over to get a decent look at it as they headed out.

Goldentail pranced about and said, "Where to now?"

Fantasia noticed the interest and handed the dagger over for Morin to examine at his leisure, she supposed she'd roll a d20 later to decide who got it. A silent laugh shook her shoulders at the thought, but she kept the mirth caged for now.

"To now?" she blinked and came to a sudden stop, then looked around. "Umm. Y'know, I hadn't really given any thought on that one..."

"Let's head back to Torn Elkandu, for starters," Thorn suggested.

Morin looked over the dagger cross-eyed for several moments before handing it back.

Fantasia hmmed thoughtfully and wet the tip of her nose with a flash of pink tongue. "Torn Elkandu, right... I wonder..."

She took the dagger back and tucked it into a side pocket of her pack, then wandered out of the temple in absent thought. She'd had all these adventures, and made a few new friends along the way, but maybe it would be a good time to head home...


End file.
